VanillaSoft: The Power of Simplicity

David Hood, President & CEO

Today, in the era of digitalization and mobility, inside sales is outpacing the traditional outside sales model. Inside sales is not only cheaper for an organization to execute and easier to scale, but also fulfill the needs of a modern day buyer who is on the lookout for an immediate and easily accessible sales engagement process. The emergence of low cost easy-to-use SaaS tools along with new technologies such as Web meetings and VoIP further accelerates this radical shift to inside sales. “Sales methods are shifting. Organizations that deploy the right set of inside sales tools can manage sales prospects effectively, follow-up consistently, and optimize lead generation,” remarks David Hood, President and CEO of VanillaSoft. A frontrunner in lead management, appointment setting and CRM software for inside sales teams and companies doing sales by phone, VanillaSoft creates a productive and intuitive sales environment for clients.

Sales to the Power of Queue

A traditional CRM displays contacts or leads in a ‘list-based’ format where a salesperson searches through a list of prospects. VanillaSoft's core software architecture however is built from the ground up on a ‘queue-based’ technology that allows sales managers to finely control lead flow and create powerful sales momentum. At the heart of this queue-based platform is pre-defined logic that is determined in advance by the administrator and automatically serves up the next-best-lead, one lead at a time. This helps to prevent cherry picking and moves leads through the sales funnel more quickly, allowing deeper list penetration and negating the need for manual filtering.

Sales methods are shifting. Organizations that deploy the right set of inside sales tools can manage sales prospects effectively, follow-up consistently, and optimize lead generation

One of VanillaSoft's clients was facing major challenges with their list based system. Productivity was low, employee turnover high, and important leads were often ignored or lost. The company had an in-house team that set high-value appointments with specialists at pre-identified companies. “The customer was facing challenges in training sales people. Identifying priority leads and ensuring follow up was a major problem,” explains Hood. Many new employees struggled to effectively implement the rather complex sales process within a reasonable time frame, and the company witnessed a high turnover rate which limited their ability to grow. With VanillaSoft they were able to automate important parts of the sales process and lead selection, ensuring that management priorities were met while allowing salespeople to do what they do best—engage in quality conversations. In addition, VanillaSoft provided the client with other productivity-enhancing features such as predefined email templates and VoIP services including automated dialing and voicemail drop.

To determine the most effective technology approach for inside sales lead-management systems, VanillaSoft collaborated with the University of Ottawa’s Telfer School of Management to conduct a quantitative analysis. The main objective of the study was to identify the key enablers in the inside sales industry and to deduce which type of system architecture—list based or queue-based—is more effective. The research revealed that a queue-based system helps organizations significantly increase the initial contact speed as well as the number of contact attempts, helping to reduce lead decay and ultimately leading to accelerated sales.

“A queue-based platform not only improves the number of calls per hour a user can make in comparison to a list-based system, but also ensures that leads are contacted much sooner and more frequently—helping to meet the goal of responding to a new lead within five minutes,” says Hood.

Automating Processes Not People

VanillaSoft takes sales productivity to the next level as users can access information such as email history, company information and even their appointment calendar—all from a single screen. The system helps companies enforce a consistent corporate message with pre-defined email templates that automate the lead-nurturing process as well as flexible branch scripting.

Managers can keep an eye on the sales teams' productivity as well as follow different lead campaigns through VanillaSoft’s customizable dashboards and other reporting tools. Moreover, features such as the ability to do electronic contracts through a DocuSign integration and the option to integrate payment gateways for direct credit card processing render the lead management software truly versatile for multiple sales efforts.

In one instance, VanillaSoft assisted prominent Florida-based engineering company National Cost. They were in search of an automated and easy to use sales CRM software which could simplify decision making by automatically routing the right leads. “The most important issue was the need for a central system, where sales personnel could access and manage over 145,000 leads while using a consistent sales process,” says Hood. Ultimately the company experienced significant time and cost savings with VanillaSoft.

“Since a thriving sales operation takes more than just a list of leads and a phone, VanillaSoft will continue to revolutionize the world of inside sales and deliver higher contact rates and sales accountability tools like no other,” says Hood.